Sermons on Salvation (Page 2)
No Separation
Welcome to the Season of Creation! It’s good to be here with you all again after two weeks of being away enjoying the wonders of God’s Creation. I was grateful to be north of the fires and so suffered very little from the smoke. We stayed in a little house with a veranda that looked into the forest and every morning and evening the bird feeder was visited by a tribe of steller’s jays. One of the interesting things about…
Heart Transplant
Romans 7:15-25a Matthew 11:16-19, 25-30 Our second reading this morning is from Paul’s Letter to the Romans. Romans is often considered the most systematic statement of Paul’s theology. In most of his other letters, Paul is responding at least in part to particular problems in the church to which he writes. But in Romans, he seems to be trying to express his deepest understandings of the gospel. Today’s passage is a difficult one because it is taken out of its…
Risen
Photo by Andrew McKie on Pexels Colossians 3:1-4 John 20:1-18 I wonder why Mary did not recognize Jesus? Was it because her eyes were blinded by the light from the angels? Was it because her eyes were filled with tears and in her grief she was not able to see properly? Or was it simply that she did not expect to see him there? This is perhaps one of my favorite gospel passages. I love the simplicity yet the intimacy…
Born from Above
Photo by Hu Chen @ unsplash.com Genesis 12:1-4a Romans 4:1-5, 13-17 John 3:1-17 When I was a teenager, I was very certain about many things. I knew, for example, exactly how one was born again and I tried to help other people receive Jesus by saying the simple words, “I accept Jesus as my Lord and Savior.” I didn’t realize that some people might just say that in order to amuse themselves, or in order to get rid of me,…
Get Up!
Transfiguration Sunday (Last Sunday of Epiphany) Sermon February 23, 2020 St. Benedict’s Episcopal Church, Los Osos, California Message from the Mountain (Invocation of the Holy Spirit, suggested by words in Celtic Daily Prayer) Most powerful Holy Spirit, come down upon us and subdue us From heaven, where the ordinary is made glorious, and glory seems but ordinary. Open our spiritual ears, that we hear a word from God. Amen. Transfiguration is a translation of Greek that happens to…
Discipleship and Forgiveness – Lorienne Schwenk
Reconciliation by Vasconcellos, Coventry Cathedral Photo by Martinvl [CC BY-SA (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0)] 1 Corinthians 3:1-9 Matthew 5:21-37 This morning I am going to continue the theme of discipleship we have been hearing in Epiphany. We will look at discipleship through two lenses: one much needed, the other a trap. Forgiveness and Idolatry. Our Gospel is full of provocations and that’s good. Like the question we discussed at our tables just three weeks ago at the Annual Meeting. As a reminder: “…in…
Is Your God too Small?
Photo by Frances Gunn @unsplash.com Luke 20:27-38 Let’s begin with a riddle: Picture this scene: There was a car wreck. It was the fault of a man in a small car who darted out in front of a big car causing the big car to crash through a store window. The people in the small car were not hurt. In the big car there was one person injured and one person dead. A manslaughter charge was never filed against…
Storm
Luke 8:22-25 One summer Jill and I and a friend chartered a small sailing boat to explore part of Alaska. It was very small – there were two berths both big enough for two very close friends. We had one, our friend the other. The crew somehow slept on the table in the cabin. It was a good week and on the last day we were headed back to Juneau for a night in a real bed before flying out…
God’s Name for You
God’s Name for You 1 Kings 19:1-4, (5-7), 8-15a Psalm 42 and 43 Galatians 3:23-29 Luke 8:26-39 Today’s gospel reading raises as many questions as it answers. Questions like what happened to all the pig corpses? What about the livelihood of the pig farmers? does God hate pigs? and the more complex – if the demons went into the pigs rather than the abyss and then the pigs committed suicide – what happened to the demons? do demons drown? I…
HOW DO WE KNOW JESUS ROSE FROM THE DEAD?
Tonight I would like to share one of many theological theories regarding the idea that God had a master plan at creation, and how the manner of death, burial and resurrection of Jesus was an integral part of that plan. This theory says that God, being omniscient and knowing that man would sin and perish without divine help, had prepared a plan for salvation for us to be reconciled with God. This salvation was to be through the death and…